Submitted by Jaisingh Thakur (India), Jul 29, 2007 at 02:23
Every Indian will have nothing except sympathy and understanding for the present sorry plight of the Baloch people. The martyrdom of their revered leader, Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti by the merciless Pakistani army, although uncommented on in the Western and the U.S. press, has nevertheless, evoked a wave of sympathy for the Balochs, and their freedom struggle in the hearts of the Indian people.
The sporadic incidents of violence which we often see on our T.V.screens, are the net result of the large-scale and needless violence initiated against the peace-loving people of the province, by the Pakistani army, and although one cannot justify it, one must, at least, make an effort to understand the factors behind it and eliminate them. Take away the violence of the Pakistani army in Balochistan and you will have done away with the violent reaction of the people.
Pakistan, as every one knows by now, was essentially an imperial construct, created by the British for their own selfish reasons, after cobbling together the muslim-majority provinces of undivided India. Sir Cyril Radcliff, faced as he was with the onerous task of accomplishing the task within a given dead line, was forced to overlook the most important ingredients that go into constituting a " nation ", took the easy way out. " Islam" was deemed to be the cement that would hold these disparate and mutually hostile entities together - an assumption which was sunk into the depths of the Bay of Bengal in 1971.!
The net result of Sir Radcliff's exercise is the existence of a nation which, although geographically located in Asia, looks to the Middle East to find its identity, a nation which although not lacking in resources of its own, has survived on the charity practised by the Saudis and the U.S.A. ever since its birth, a nation which, having grabbed the most fertile parts of the Punjab from the Hindus and Sikhs in 1947, yet finds it impossible to feed its populace, a nation where its rogue scientists trade nuclear know-how to rogue nations thus bringing the world several steps closer to annihilation, a nation which having achieved its "freedom" in the name of "muslim" homeland, is now engaged in the important task of defining who is a "muslim" and who is not a muslim. I would urge Mehran to just bide her time. Balochistan is bound to get its freedom from Pakistani yoke one day in the same manner that Bangla Desh got in 1971!
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